The hallmark of liberalism

The hallmark of liberalism is that changes in the social environment produce corresponding changes in human development. But if people's destinies are written in their genes, why waste money on social programs? Such thinking has led to a profound conservative shift in the last thirty years. This can be demonstrated by comparing the shifting climate of opinion in the United States, which in 1965 produced the Great Society--a vast number of social programs designed to improve the health and welfare of the poor, the elderly, and the minority populations--and in 1995 brought about the Contract with America, which generated cutbacks in many of those same programs and marked a change in attitude about what government can be expected to do for its citizens. These changes have taken place not only in the West but in many other countries as well. Indeed, the widespread retreat of communism as a force in world politics is doubtlessly linked to the collapse of faith in social engineering, caused by the failure of communism to create the positive changes expected of it.